Samaranch Swords



By Tony Kornheiser



Sunday, August 4 1996; Page F01

The Washington Post 



ATLANTA -- His Excellency Juan Antonio Samaranch President, International

Olympic Committee



Your Excellency,



Please accept my sincere congratulations on a splendid Olympics. I bought loads of

souvenirs, including an official Izzy anti-shrapnel vest.



By the way, how did you get to be "Your Excellency"? Were you promoted from

"Your Very Goodness"? There aren't enough blowhard titles in America. If I had a

title I'd like it to be something that would help me get chicks, like "Your Mammoth

Groinship."



Anyway, I want to congratulate you on a number of things, starting with how you

were able to stretch a track meet, a swim meet, a noncompetitive basketball

tournament and some chippies in leotards balancing themselves on shower rods into

16 days of prime-time TV. The swim meet lasted a week! All you could see were

flailing elbows and the tops of bathing caps. If watching water churn is so exciting,

how come they don't sell tickets to a Laundromat? And what about small-bore rifle

shooting? As long as we're shooting small bores, sign me up for Richard Simmons.



I have enjoyed the thousands of taped pieces about Olympic athletes overcoming

tragedies in their lives, especially the overwrought ones narrated by the simpering

dope John Tesh. It's amazing how many of these Olympians have had close relatives

die horribly, or have suffered tragic illnesses, or survived tragic kiln explosions, or

watched their cat stick its head in the goldfish bowl and eat "Buster." I'm shocked,

since so many of the athletes are young and seem to come from middle-class homes.

I figured the biggest tragedy in their lives was that they once got into bad traffic going

to the mall.



Your Excellency, I know it pains you that some members of the press criticize some

of the sillier Olympic sports, like rhythmic gymnastics, where girls balance plates on

their noses like seals, and the zinc oxide sports like beach volleyball and windsurfing

-- because, come on, what's next: pogo stick parasailing? But I love all the Olympic

sillysports, particularly Ping-Pong and badminton, because: 1) I can play them in my

rec room or my yard; 2) there's no danger of Bela Karolyi picking me up and

carrying me around; and 3) I can use the word "shuttlecock" in a sentence and not

lose my job.



I am particularly intrigued, though, by the modern pentathlon, an event created by

Baron de Coubertin 85 years ago. What a wacko concept. The modern pentathlon is

based on the premise that you are a soldier, and you have to deliver a message to the

front lines. To get past the enemy you have to display ability in running, swimming,

riding horseback, shooting and fencing. Of course, if you had to deliver a message to

the front lines in a truly modern pentathlon, the five disciplines would be: phone, fax,

pager, e-mail and satellite uplink. And the coach of the U.S. team would be Bill

Gates.



Baron de Coubertin created the first designer event in the Olympics. If he can do it,

so can I. 



I decided to invent an event that would give me, and only me, a good shot for the

gold. So I've come up with the Baron von Kornheiser triathlon, which tests disciplines

important in my life.



1. The first event would be the field-narrower, the one designed to eliminate most of

my potential competition. I call this event "The Bowling Ball Catapult." A bowling ball

would be placed on one end of a regulation playground seesaw. The competitor will

be required to leap onto the other end, tuchus first, so as to hurl the bowling ball the

greatest possible distance. This will immediately eliminate anyone who is not both fat

(I'd like to see perky Kerri Strug launch that Brunswick Bad Boy more than a few

inches) and sedentary, with a well-padded behind accustomed to long hours riding

the pine in, say, a newsroom. 



2. Sarcasm. Competitors are put in a hotel with no room service, no cable, no

turn-down service and cheap towels. They are judged by how long it takes them to

contact the front desk ("Oh, good, there's someone working here. And why did you

seek employment here, dear? Lose your job to an automatic pin setter?"), demand to

speak to the hotel manager ("unless he hasn't gotten off his shift at the 7-Eleven yet")

and start complaining about the accommodations ("If I'd known I was staying in a rat

hole, I'd have brought Cheez Whiz. By the way, who does your decorating here --

Ray Charles?").



3. Whining. Competitors remain in the hotel room and are judged by how quickly

they call their offices and ask to come home, as well as on the creativity and boldness

of the excuses they offer ("I swear -- my pancreas exploded"). 



Lastly, I think the winner ought to get something more than a gold medal. I was

pleased to see that Hong Kong rewarded its first-ever medalist, Lee Lai-Shan, with

free subway rides for life. At the moment, though, nobody knows whose "life" that

refers to -- Lee's or Hong Kong's, as China is scheduled to take over the colony

from the British next year. My advice to Lee is to get in that subway now, and be

prepared to ride forever beneath the streets of Hong Kong, like Charlie on the MTA.



I think America ought to offer its Olympic winners a lifetime supply of some product,

too. I have been trying to think of the perfect product, something lowly but important,

the sort of thing you take for granted, something you don't appreciate until you look

around and don't see any of it anywhere. 



I know -- humility. 



© Copyright 1996 The Washington Post Company